


a fruitless future

by heavenreis



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Denial of Feelings, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Food, Forehead Kisses, Forehead Touching, Holding Hands, Implied/Referenced Sex, Kissing, Kissing at Midnight, Mutual Pining, Nightmares, One Shot, Pining, Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan Manga Spoilers, Slow Burn, ish
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 01:35:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29910144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heavenreis/pseuds/heavenreis
Summary: two people on the wrong sides of war.two people who seek solace under the comfort of the moon and an empty kitchen.two people who change each other for the better.but, in the end, an inevitable fruitless future awaits for them.- the development of sasha and niccolo's relationship before chapter 105.
Relationships: Sasha Blouse/Niccolo
Comments: 3
Kudos: 42





	a fruitless future

**Author's Note:**

> hi!  
> this is my first time writing something after two years of writer's burnout, so i'm still a bit rusty at this.  
> this was initially a one shot, but i think i'm going to turn it into a small fic, since i really want to explore what niccolo and sasha's relationship may have been like before marley arc *cries*
> 
> i hope you all enjoy, and comments + kudos are highly appreciated!

**"I cannot let you burn me up, nor can I resist you."**   
_\- A.S. Bryatt_

He did not get another chance to see her again, and nor did she. He assumed that she was held back in meetings, or stuck in combat training, and he was constantly slaving away in the kitchens every single day, cooking meals for the Eldians. 

It brought him joy once; he’d remember his comrades sneaking down to the kitchens with smuggled booze and cigarettes, and whilst he made feasts for them every night they would guffaw and tell stories of freedom and what they would do after the war in the dim candlelight. Some had old sweethearts waiting for their return, others were more ambitious and dreamed of venturing into Paradis Island, hoping to cut down the devils once and for all.

Or so, before he saw blood staining the sea, their bodies rising to the surface as the Attack Titan towered over the crumpled Navy fleet.

And now here he is, serving platefuls of food to grouchy Garrison officials, who demanded and jeered at him, sometimes even throwing scraps and bones as he took away their plates. Blood perpetually curdling, he could spit in their food if he wanted to, or under cook the meat, hoping they would all just die. He could be locked up for sure, killed even, if one was to actually die from food poisoning, but what good would that do for his dead comrades, the ones who were stuck aimlessly in their tunnel vision of a fruitless future. It managed to lower the bubbling rage that had almost over spilled onto the basin of his miserable reality.

He tries to sleep, but is plagued with the scratches of his friend’s nails that had dug into his arms, and desperate flitting eyes burning into the back of his skull before he fell to his death impaled by an upstanding harpoon on the lower deck of the ship.

And he screams, his forehead slick with cold sweat, stung with the bitter prick of fresh tears glistening under the sombre presence of the moon.

His final solution: staying up all night, sitting at the kitchen table, a cigarette in his mouth. Smoke dwindles above him in long vines as he stares hardly into the endless night, cursing the Eldians, cursing the war, cursing everything in the world that brought him misery. That brought him here.

“What is that?”

He jumps, eyes snapping up to honey coloured orbs gleaming curiously at the ashy bud drooping between his teeth. She holds the rack of breakfast pastries he baked earlier on, her hair loose, cascading down in soft waves from the ponytail she had kept in all day. 

He raises an eyebrow at her, slightly amused at the fact that she was attempting to steal food, but he doesn’t show it.

“What is that?” he retorts, eyes flicking down to the tray and returning back to hers. Cheeks rising with that same familiar heat, he stubs out his cigarette, mentally slapping himself.  
_She_ was a devil, a gluttonous one for sure, and that was all she would ever be. A merciless soldier of the worldwide feared race, an enemy of Marley, a phenomenon who terrorised the mere existence of every living thing. Not to mention, she was probably friends with that damned Eren Jaeger, the one who carries death with every step he takes.

But the freckles that peppered her bare arms were like chocolate curls that embraced his pastries, the soft twinkle of her golden honeyed orbs when she looked at him oh so innocently, and the moonbeams that danced against her silhouette was enough for him to betray Marley, enough for him to betray his morals, enough for him to intertwine his fingers with hers, and take her far away from this shithole of a war, to see her savour his food and bask under her satisfaction. 

Pathetic, he thought. He was a pathetic man. 

The girl loved food. So what?

The girl loved _his_ food. That’s what.

 _His_ food; personal recipes memorised backwards and front, meals he’d spent hours perfecting and improvising.

 _His_ food; though foreign to her, and she still devoured it as if she had not had a meal in ages, despite her usual tastes.

“I was hungry,” she shrugs, inspecting a croissant before stuffing it all in her mouth. 

He swore he felt his heart thump a little harder than usual. He hopes she doesn’t hear it.

“This… is a cigarette.” he says, staring at the crumbled filter and the black ash that had contaminated it.

“Can you eat them?” she asks, between mouthfuls. “Do they taste any good?”

His lips tug into a bemused smile. Did they really not have cigarettes behind the walls?

“No… it’s a stress reliever. Tastes like shit.”

She stops eating, eyes perking up once more. Before he could register anything, she had dumped the tray on the table, sitting opposite him, nimble fingers already clasped on the white and red box, and her mouth suddenly quietened with the white stick between her teeth.

“No seriously!” he cries suddenly, grabbing her wrist that was holding the pack. “Trust me, you really don’t want to know what it tastes like.”

She widens those doe eyes of hers, surprised by the swift physical contact, and his immediate concern. Blood rushed to her cheeks, praying to Rose, Maria and Sina that he cannot see them under the moonlight. 

She could make out his features under the blue reflection of the clear night; his wavy blonde hair was tousled and it reminded her of the ripples of the untouched sand when she and her squad saw the ocean for the very first time, his eyes, though sunken, had lost all fiery resentment that made her walls tumble, spiking a new insecurity that she could not comprehend when they’d met for the first time, and had now beheld a mist that she found herself wanting to lose herself in. 

But she shouldn’t. 

Because they were supposed to hate each other.

So why did her heart slam hard against her ribcage, rattling her breathing as he gently plucked the cigarette out of her mouth, the contact between his skin and her lip brewing the blood in her body, and she was almost sure her eardrums had burst from the quick thump-thump-thump reverberating in such a way she had never felt before. 

Why could she almost feel tears forming as his hand softly pressed on her wrist; she could swear he rolled his thumb ever so tenderly across the rippled ridge of a scar that she got from a hunting trip.

And almost immediately he drew back, slumping against his chair, and avoiding her eyes. 

Pathetic, she thought, fingers fumbling and interlocking in and out as she stares downwards.

She was a pathetic woman. 

He held her hand, and looked at her like she wasn’t a devil. So what?

He saw her as she was in that moment. That’s what.

Not to mention the panic in his voice when she took his cigarettes. 

Silence filled the room for several seconds, before he pulled the tray towards him. She was about to cry out in protestation, but stopped as he stares deep into her eyes, the small ghost of a smile as points out the pink dusting of her cheeks.

His smile.

How beautiful. 

“Hey, if you don’t eat these, why… don’t you come back here tomorrow night? I can make you something.” he asks quietly, instantly regretting it all, greys averting goldens as he raises one hand to his neck.

She blinks.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. St-

His hands are suddenly greeted with an unfamiliar warmth, a warmth that he allowed.

“Like a midnight feast?” she squeals, half of her body stretched closer to his across the table, her eyes glinting excitedly. 

“Yeah…” he replies, his head dizzy at the new contact. 

Her hands were way smaller than his, but calloused. Soldier’s hands. Eldian hands. Had they been stained with the life of another yet?

He took lives too, he reminded himself. So why is he questioning her? Is it because she’s the enemy? Or is it the fact that he did not want to believe she could be as compassionate and still have the ability to kill others?

Either way, he almost shook away these troubles as he basks under the soft warmth of her hands, still beaming luminously as ever.

“Deal! I’ll see you tomorrow night then, Niccolo!”

And so, as Sasha Braus left the room, she couldn't help but think of not only the feast, but also of Niccolo and the time she had just spent with him.

Would he hold her hand again, even though she was nothing but a devil in his eyes?


End file.
